San Francisco Opera invites you and your family to attend FREE screenings of our Opera-in-an-Hour Movies presented throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. To learn about where you can catch a screening of our family friendly operas, click here.

Incest. Dragons. Bastard sons. Unexpected love stories. Girls disguised as boys. Why, George R.R. Martin took more than one page from opera when he created his epic series Game of Thrones! And so as we eagerly anticipate the premiere of season 4 on Sunday night, we at San Francisco Opera give you 15 Ways Opera is like Game of Thrones:

Have you seen the August issue of Opera News? The cover story is called “Opera’s Next Wave: The Voices and Faces of the Future.” It’s a great article, and well worth reading while it’s still out on newsstands. Here at San Francisco Opera, we couldn’t help but swell with pride at how many familiar faces graced the pages of this article. Quite a good number of these up and coming opera stars have performed on the War Memorial Opera House stage in the last several years or are scheduled to make debuts in the near future. Which of these fine young musicians, which Opera News predicts will “break out and become major forces in the field in the coming decade,” have we brought to Bay Area audiences lately? Allow us a trip down memory lane. [Left: Luca Pisaroni in The Marriage of Figaro]

A giant passed away. A man that has served as a major inspiration for so many people, Steve Jobs, the former CEO and creator of Apple Inc. is now flying with the angels above. Mr. Jobs must be one of the most forward looking men of the 20th and 21st centuries; he was a man of huge ideas that reached the masses. He was also a man with a message: never look back, never think small. This message resonates loudly and clearly today for all of us committed to breathing life into a world of music and art that is suffering in a time of economic chaos.

One of the things I enjoy most about attending opera is that the music is often so timeless and wonderful that I can see the same show re-imagined hundreds of times and each time it will come to life and touch me in a new and meaningful way. The same thing is true for performing in opera.

Opera designer and director John Pascoe created the designs for this fanciful and opulent production of Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia in 2008 with Washington National Opera and Renee Fleming.

With the opening of our third opera of the season less than a week away, we decided to whet your appetite with John Pascoe's gorgeous costume sketches for this production, which marks the first time we have ever ever presented the opera in our history.

Introduction

Backstage at San Francisco Opera is a fascinating, fast-moving, mysterious and sacred space for the Company’s singers, musicians, dancers, technicians and production crews. Musical and staging rehearsals are on-going, scenery is loaded in and taken out, lighting cues are set, costumes and wigs are moved around and everything is made ready to receive the audience. From the principal singers, chorus and orchestra musicians to the creative teams for each opera, in addition to the many talented folks who don’t take a bow on stage, this blog offers unique insight, both thought-provoking and light-hearted, into the life backstage at San Francisco Opera.